The Death of a Friend
by Mindblade16
Summary: What has happened to Noble Scarlet?
1. Chapter 1

******* Disclaimer ********

I don't own "Oh My Goddess" or anything related to it. Be it manga, anime, or action figures(I wish I did ^_~)

This is my first story under this nick, so I hope you enjoy this first chapter!

The Death of a Friend

Part I

Skuld was weeping in the corner of her room. Her tears dripped heartily down her young face, if you could call her young. She was young enough by goddess standards. As she cried, hunched down, holding her knees tightly, Banpei buzzed in the doorway. He looked at her with lifeless eyes and cocked his head in concern. Skuld looked up, tears still streaming down. Then she stood up and walked towards Banpei. She stopped in front of him and stalled. After about ten seconds she threw her arms around him, causing his metallic frame to clack and creak.

"Oh Banpei-sama…I can't believe it. I can't believe it."

Banpei stalled as she had done, then slowly arced his metal arms back around Skuld's soft but strong body. Her form was not based in the strength of muscles, but in its infusion and base of divine energy, which held far more contact and pull with this reality than could be conceived. In this, however, she was not the same as her older sister, Belldandy. Bell's composition was far more advanced and many times further in purity. This was because she was of a higher rank; a goddess first class. Speaking of Belldandy, she soon heard Skuld's crying and quickly appeared in front of Skuld's door, with a look of concern on her face.

"Skuld, what's wrong?"

"Oh sis.." she muttered in halting breaths

"Come on, Skuld. You can let it out."

"Ok."

With that, Skuld's head rose to meet her sister's kind gaze. But she did not let go of her security blanket, which was her Banpei.

"My angel..she… died this morning!"

She bawled again and buried her face against Banpei's helmet, as Belldandy stood with a look of shock on her face; her eyes wide.

"I..I thought Noble Scarlet was still inside her egg on your necklace.." Belldandy barely choked out.

"No. She came out while I was asleep. She woke me up kissing my forehead and then she turned to ash."

Belldandy scanned the room, and found a pile of greyish dust in the middle of the floor.

"Oh Skuld..I'm so sorry."

The little goddess raised her head again and looked at Belldandy.

"It's all my fault. I kept her in that egg for too long. I heard from Urd that this might happen, but I didn't believe it."

Belldandy slumped her shoulders a bit, then regained her grace and composure, closing her eyes.

"Skuld" She said, moving a confused Banpei out from between them, "Let's have some tea. It will help calm you down."

Skuld, grasping for her robot, lowered her arms a little and nodded, wiping away her tears on her sleeve.

They both walked down the hall and into the kitchen, where Belldandy put the kettle on the stove, turning up the heat. Short flames burst up from below the kettle, which would soon boil the moderate amount of water inside. As the flames burst upward, there was a pleasant "fwoosh" sound that made the older goddess smile.

Skuld kneeled down on a cushion in front of the low table. She wrung her fingers nervously and hung her head just a little as Belldandy pulled the mugs out from the cupboard and placed them on the counter. She opened another cupboard and brought out the teabags.

"Hmm..I think white tea this time, with an infusion of chamomile."

Skuld sniffled, and turned her head as if she was watching something. But it was just to hide her face, and possibly to ignore her own feelings.

"So, what happens now?" Skuld asked

"We need to report this to Yggdrasil. Peorth will need to make sure this event is logged into the system. There is also the issue of the Almighty One. He needs to be informed when a divine being such as an Angel dies. It..will not be easy to hear."

Skuld lowered her eyes and stopped wringing her hands as she turned her head back.

The water started to boil as Belldandy got the honey out and popped the cap. This was good honey, from the farmer's market downtown. She preferred honey to sugar, at least in her tea. Belldandy had a real talent for making tea, which was not as much a hard subject as one which required devotion and patience, in which she revelled.

Banpei whirred and buzzed as he walked in, as was his custom. It was not that he was poorly built, far from it. It was because Skuld loved the sound of meshing sprockets and the hum of small motors. Skuld knew he only wanted to help, and waved at him to come closer. He folded his legs down under his body and sat to her left, where she had been staring before.

"My poor Angel. She was so young; even younger than me. Noble Scarlet-Sama was my friend. "

Belldandy took the kettle off the flames and turned them down to nothing. She poured the boiling water into the mugs and proceeded to add the honey and the teabags, mixing the contents of the mugs lightly, with the grace of an Angel. This caused a fluttering of wings from out of her back for only an instant.

She took up the two mugs and placed one in front of Skuld, and one straight across where she planned on sitting. She did so, and they both watched the smoke rise from the concoctions. The tea needed to steep anyway, at least for a while. It also needed time to cool down so that it would not burn their tongues. Not that it would do much damage to goddesses, but there was discomfort to be had, and neither of them could stomach another ounce of misery at this point. But, as the aroma of the honey and tea rose to their nostrils, some of those feelings melted away. It wasn't much, but it helped enough. At least, for now.

"I remember when I first met Noble Scarlet." mused Belldandy , "She was full of life and curiosity, but you weren't ready to have you're an Angel of your very own. It broke my heart to see her return to that egg. I'm sorry it came to this after all that has happened."

"I know. It was so sudden. I wonder if Urd was right. There must have been some reason. Angels don't die from anything simple. It takes a lot. We may be immortal, and we age slowly, over thousands of years. Angels are immortal in that way too, but both our kinds can get hurt by major events in history. It takes a lot of force to kill our kind. We're not totally invincible." Said Skuld.

Belldandy closed her eyes and sighed.

"You are correct. It does take a lot. Urd must have been wrong about the egg problem. Then again, Noble Scarlet was not that strong of an Angel. Perhaps she was so weak that even something simple could have done it."

Skuld stood up, with a blazing up of fire in her eyes.

"My Angel was NOT weak!"

This outburst caused the tea to boil again, as was part of her power; the power over water.

Urd walked into the kitchen, sensing a sudden burst of divine power.

"Is everything alright?" asked Urd

Skuld shook her little fists at her sides but soon calmed down and slumped back onto her cushion.

"It's alright, Skuld. Perhaps you're right. In that case we have to find the cause."

Urd looked confused and took a seat at the table. She yawned and looked at Skuld, then at Belldandy.

"What's up? Is anything wrong?"

"Noble Scarlet…has passed away" said Belldandy before Skuld could object.

This caused Skuld to abruptly stand up again in tears. She ran from the room, leaving small streams of water behind her.

"Skuld!" yelled Belldandy, half standing

Urd took Skuld's mug and dropped a virus pill into it, immediately cooling the tea and adding a dimensional pocket filled with heavenly liquor. It was a small pocket, as she didn't want the mug to overflow. As she stirred her new prize, she looked over at Belldandy, who soon sat back down.

"This is going to be a hard time for Skuld. No, for all of us." Belldandy said weakly.

I hope you liked this first part! Tune in for more! ^_^


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer:

I don't own "Oh My Goddess!" or anything related. I do, however, reserve the right to play with the characters and the setting; giving my own turn on the story.

The Death of a Friend

Part II

Up, way up into the clouds and further on, the fabric of reality spins and churns. Mixing with the ether and the dust, elaborate signs in spiral form give rise to multitudes of platforms in this far-off place across the stars. Some call it heaven, others; Asgard. It is many things to many people, but it is the home of Peorth, goddess first class; second category; unlimited license. Peorth is a Systems Administrator of the Holy Tree Yggdrassil; an infinitely massive computer system that runs heaven, as well as the whole of reality. This system is administrated by countless high class goddesses, in many different functions, but it is frequently the job of Peorth to be the senior ranking goddess admin in charge of the higher parts of the main system. This computer does not run on any machine code or language that could be conceived of on earth, but on a music of vibration and light. Sometimes the functions of the Tree use the harmonics of the songs of goddesses and their angels, but most of the time it all runs on harps played and tuned by the goddesses. At any rate, Peorth, on this lovely day, was working on her harp in a high platform chair which practically screamed of circles and similar patterns. The chair overlooked a plethora of other platforms manned by goddess after goddess, all surrounding as well as inside Yggrdrasil.

The phone next to her rung a delightful melody, and Peorth picked it up.

"Hello! You've reached the Goddess Help Line! May I..Oh! Hello Belldandy, always nice to hear from you."

"I have something to report to Yggdrasil. It is important." Said Belldandy on the other end of the line.

"Important? Like I haven't heard that all day for a millennia. What happened?"

"Skuld's Angel; Noble Scarlet has turned to Ash. We don't know why."

There was a pause where neither of them breathed.

"I see. I'll log it into the system. I'll also be informing our Lord personally."

"I understand." Said Belldandy

After another long breathless pause, Peorth sighed.

"I take it little Skuld is having a hard time right now?"

"You could say that. She hardly talks, but she has calmed down considerably." Said Belldandy

"Anything else to report?"

"Yes. I want this to be investigated. Angels just don't turn to ash for no reason."

"Of course. I'll be in touch then." Said Peorth.

Both goddesses hung up as if they had been in sync since birth, even the clacking sounds from resting the receiver were in harmony. But not many but their lord knew of such things. Indeed, it was the little things such as this that held enough divine power that even the Lord of Heaven had to make note of it.

Peorth sighed once more.

"Another Angel death. This can't just be a coincidence."

She picked up the receiver again and dialed out to request a temporary replacement for her station. She was going to see The Almighty One.

Belldandy stood by the phone for a moment, sulking just a bit, but perking right up in her usual way when Keiichi walked in the front door. It had been a hard day of classes at Nekomi Tech, and thus far, he had been chased by a Doberman Pinscher, nearly hit by a bus, and teased mercilessly by the Campus Queen. As such, he was about ready to flop down on the floor when Bell came over and caught him mid-fall.

She smiled sweetly at her Keiichi and took him into the parlor to rest on the couch, where Urd was sitting.

"You've earned a nice rest. Sit down and lay back Keiichi." Said Belldandy

With that, Belldandy pulled a lever on the side of the couch and the leg-rest came undone with a "sproing" noise, elevating his tired feet. She gently removed his shoes and socks and set them down close-by. He closed his eyes, but opened them suddenly when he felt a hand on his thigh, rubbing slightly northward.

"Urd! Stop that!" clamored Keiichi.

Urd giggled, holding back the impulse to break out laughing at poor, poor Keiichi. She removed her hand and returned to watching TV, a source of entertainment which hadn't been noticed by anyone else in nearly a week. Humans and goddesses had been either sleeping, working, cleaning, tinkering, or just having tea, or in Urd's case, fine aged liquor spiced with special virus concoction experiments. It was amazing she hadn't been done in long ago as much as she experimented on herself, but she was an expert in her field, whatever that meant.

Skuld had been reclusive, staying in her room the entire day with her Banpei. She was tinkering with his inner components to enhance his torque and cognitive reasoning. It was all she could do to stop thinking about the jar of ash on the windowsill. She had also, on Urd's request, filled a glass vial with some of her mourning tears. The vial was waiting for its new mistress in a leather vial array hanging from the window lock. She would give it to her eldest sister in due time, but for now, she worked diligently at keeping her mind occupied and emotions in check.

Belldandy stood outside the door, half reaching for the handle, half holding her grasping hand back. Skuld needed to be left to her own devices right now(full pun intended), and Bell was inwardly crying just a little to mourn her little sister's loss. No, it was her loss too, but it was similar to the difference between a lover and a friend, and the middle goddess just could not reconcile with that. The intimacy between a goddess and her angel was so much deeper than that of lovers; a fact Belldandy understood far too well. Holy Bell was more than just an Angel to her. She was more than just an extension of her form. She was more than a friend, much more. But Skuld had not even had the time to explore those feelings to the proper depth with her own angel. Nevertheless, it was a cruel fate for both of them.

Belldandy suddenly broke into a run down the hall and into her room, closing the door behind her. She gazed into her large mirror and Holy Bell's gaze reflected back from behind her eyes.

I hope you enjoyed this second chapter! Stay Tuned for Chapter 3!


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer:/ Oh My Goddess is not mine. I do not take, make, or bake any monies gained from the series. Nor do I wish to. I only wish to be acknowledged in this medium, on this site, as much as possible It also gives me great joy to express my love of writing, which flowers openly within me and into my fingers.. If you are reading this far, my wish has been granted. But, I would appreciate a review nonetheless. Enjoy!

The Death of a Friend

Part III

There were many pillars here, many great pillars, now reduced in number and cracked with age. It was as if these were not signposts of a noble city but those of ancient ruins. It had been this way for many years, ever since a great series of battles with invading demons from Níðhöggr. This small elder city was often visited by The Almighty One, who now stood among circles carved in stone surrounded by a gathering of trees and wandering spirits descended from high in Valhalla.

"You can come out now, young Peorth."

Peorth peeked her head out from behind a broken pillar and walked slowly towards the all father. He did not turn, but only gazed in the distance, as if looking for something. When Peorth was a short distance from him, he turned slightly, not revealing his eyes just yet. Life breathed into the goddess once more, and she stood proud before him now.

"Sir. I come with grave news."

"Could it be that,..another Angel has vanished from my sight?"

"… Yes, my lord. It has been Noble Scarlet this time. The Angel of the youngest Norn." said Peorth

The Almighty One turned around, his eyes gleaming slightly silver with wisps of green. It was as if Peorth had known this look all her life, but it was only the first time such eyes had ever been laid upon her by her Lord. However, she stood firmly in place, with her own flames of life reflecting back at him. They carried on like this for a few seconds, and then the tension eased as The Almighty One cracked a smile.

"That makes three. We cannot deny or delay any longer in this matter." He said, taking up his staff and walking towards Peorth.

He stopped and placed his hand upon her shoulder.

"I'll leave it to you. Choose a team to help you. Alpha-1 Core System Access is Granted."

As soon as those words escaped his lips, a circular whoosh of compressed air from above and below the both of them escaped into their immediate reality. Peorth's eyes flickered with bright purple light for a few seconds before she shut them tightly and opened them wide, her eyes returning.

"Thank you, Sir. I will not let you down."

She was solemn at the moment, but in her mind she was yelping with joy and bunny-hopping as she yelled:

"HOO-HOO! Alpha-1! Aaaaaalpha-1! ALPHA ONE!"

Back on earth, more notably in the Buddhist Temple where our earthwise scene was set, Keiichi Morisato has been asleep for a good 3 hours. He was mumbling in his sleep and drooling on his pillow.

"Na, no. No more. I can't eat anymore noodles, I have german class…"

Despite the fact that he could have used a good deal more sleep, Urd silently opened the door and sneaked in, shutting it behind her. She grinned maniacally at the dosing boy as he started clawing at nothing in particular. Perhaps it was something in his dream that he was reaching for.

"I'll bet it's my sister Belldandy he's lusting after even in his dreams, the poor dear" she cackled inwardly.

Her smile widened as she suddenly had an inclination to be horribly pesky. Urd pulled back the covers of Keiichi's futon and slid into bed with him, with her unzipped shirt pressing up against his back.

"Mmmm..Belldandy.." he murmured

Urd was right. He was dreaming about her dear sister. All the same she was more than a little annoyed that he wasn't dreaming of her instead, especially given the fact that they were practically spooning in the futon.

Soon enough, Urd could hear footsteps outside; down the hall. They were getting closer. Urd was almost certain it was Belldandy, so she phased down through a black portal she instantly made that vanished from the futon as soon as she was "concealed".

Skuld stopped in the hallway. She had been moping around the house all day, wandering here and there, occasionally balling her eyes out with her head against the wall. Only now she had not the tears. DIspite her affinity for water, she felt dry and frail, as if she could turn to sand and glass, cracking open and exploding a dusty death down the hall.

Banpei rolled in from outside, having finished hanging the sheets out to dry in the sunlight of this crisp autumn day. Skuld was too exhausted, even to hold her mechanical friend for even a moment. She passed him and wandered outside. This was indeed autumn. The leaves on the oak trees had shifted colors in random shades of blood orange and sunset yellow. The wind blew through the massive trees surrounding her, and she felt a calmness rise from within. The surrounding environment responded accordingly, shaking the water from inside the trees and the dew on the blades of grass around the young goddess. It wasn't calm that disrupted nature, but that which was driven out of Skuld's form out in all directions. She felt refreshed, and stretched her arms above her head, her fingers interlocked with each other.

"I need to do something," she said to herself, "I won't forget Noble Scarlet, but I can't sulk forever. It'll do me no good."

Urd jumped up and out of her portal, hovering in the air above Keiichi.

"I'll leave you alone, my sweet, for now."

With that, she drifted to the door and softly landed upon the floor. The door opened, and she passed through the entrance to the hallway, closing the door behind her.

Belldandy was in the garden, humming to herself, with a magic circle about her. It glowed shades of purple in sequence, and held many runes upon it. She was searching for something. She didn't know what it was yet, but she had a feeling. She wasn't moving much in 3 dimensions, but 5th dimensionally, she was moving through frequencies of reality, searching aimlessly for a beacon of hope in the vastness of the universe that lay within her circle. Her eyes were closed, and her hands were clasped, as if in prayer. She occasionally reached out with one hand, touching something unseen, before returning to her prayer position. Skuld was halfway hiding behind an oak tree, gazing with softly shimmering eyes at her older sister. She grasped he bark of the tree, her face blank, save for her eyes that were filled with awe.

There is part III! It was a long time coming, Long enough anyway. I hope you enjoyed it. Please come back for Chapter IV!


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